LONG BEACH – Long Beach State didn’t play spectacularly in the second half of its Big West Conference women’s basketball game against Cal State Northridge on Thursday night.

But the 49ers didn’t have to because their superlative effort in the first half was enough to propel them to a 65-49 victory over the Matadors before 656 at the Walter Pyramid.

Long Beach led, 43-16, at halftime and although Northridge began the second half with an 8-0 and the 49ers didn’t score until 6:51 had elapsed, the Matadors never got closer than 15 points.

The victory snapped Long Beach’s three-game losing streak.

Ally Wade led the 49ers with 21 points. Lauren Sims scored 15 points and Karina Figueroa had 10. Figueroa also had seven assists, all in the first half.

Ashley Bookman had a team-high eight rebounds for Long Beach, which outrebounded Northridge, 43-41.

The first half was one of the best, if not the best, the 49ers have played this season. They rebounded well, they shot well, they played incredibly on defense.

Long Beach (8-12, 4-3) made 16 of 38 shots in those first 20 minutes for 42.1 percent. They made eight of 21 from 3-point range for 38.1 percent.

“Yeah, we put it together offensively and defensively,” 49ers coach Jody Wynn said. “We made the extra pass. As a team we talk about one more pass, one more pass and that’s one thing that we really did a good job of in the first half and we did a lousy job of in the second half.”

The Matadors (3-14, 1-6) outscored Long Beach, 33-22, in the second half. But Northridge had such a big hill to climb, Long Beach could afford to have a subpar second half.

“We came out with a lot of energy and a lot of toughness and we played together,” Sims said. “We were sharing the ball, making the extra pass. It makes all the difference.”

Jasmine Erving led the Matadors with 16 points. But the Matadors’ leading scorer did not start either half and played only 17 minutes.

“Most of that had to do with scouting Long Beach,” Northridge coach Staci Schulz said. “They started someone (Lindsey Beckner) to match up with Jasmine, and we had already decided to go small. The game before that we had done so well with the full-court press by going small.”

Bridgette Conejo contributed 15 points for the Matadors and Katrina Thompson led them with a game-high 10 rebounds.

Sims led Long Beach with 13 points in the first half, Wade had 10 and Figueroa had nine.